


Observation & Commentary

by bactaqueen



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: 5 + 1 Fic, Artist!Steve, Gen, Steve editorializes through art
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-22
Updated: 2015-06-22
Packaged: 2018-04-05 15:20:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,005
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4184820
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bactaqueen/pseuds/bactaqueen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five times Nick catches Steve and one time Steve catches Nick.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Observation & Commentary

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. Recognizable characters belong to their respective owners. No profit is earned and no infringement is intended.
> 
> Author's Note: Tale mentioned this prompt in a message, and I stole it and ran with it.

-1-

The first time, it’s remarkably detailed. Nick didn’t know Rogers even had time for that much detail. If it weren’t so exaggerated, so clearly in the style of a fun fair caricature, it would be almost lifelike. Nick has seen Stark wear that very same expression, seen that very same t-shirt, though he doesn’t recognize the redhead in the same frame and the bulge in the front of Stark’s pants is disturbingly oversized. It’s… unexpected. Nick wonders if there’s something going on that he’s missed, if Natasha’s teasing about his old age is suddenly founded.

Then he sees the frame in the bottom right corner of the page and he realizes that it’s supposed to be a comic.

The punchline is Stark’s open fly and the rain of money falling around the redhead.

The  _unimpressed_ redhead.

Nick shifts his weight because he wants to laugh. Steve looks up, starting guiltily and slapping the sketchbook closed when he realizes that Nick can see what he’s drawn. In  _color_ , no less. Nick meets his eye and resolutely does not smile.

 

-2-

In the next one, a harmless-looking Barnes is crouched on top of one of the metal racks in what’s obviously supposed to be Stark’s lab. He’s only got one arm–the flesh arm. In that hand he has a cane fishing pole. The other arm–the original one, the one he wore when he came in from the cold, with the red star and the Soviet machinery–is tied to the end of the fishing line, hilariously undersized for what Nick knows the arm really weighs.

(Sometimes his jaw still smarts a little, when it’s cold, even though he knows Barnes pulled the punch.)

Stark is there, too, again, this time in the singlet and jeans he likes to wear in his lab, straining to reach the arm dangling just beyond his fingertips. Fury hides the laugh that threatens in a gruff cough, and when Steve looks up, he doesn’t look guilty at all.

It’s not exactly a secret. Stark has been after the arm for months now and Barnes won’t let him at it at all.

The corner of Steve’s mouth goes up. Nick doesn’t say anything. He just hands Steve the tablet, the mission briefing already loaded.

“Hill is waiting for you.”

 

-3-

The third time, Nick is peeking on purpose and wondering if he shouldn’t just in case someone (who isn’t Natasha or Maria) catches him and discovers that he has a sense of humor. If a man can’t protect his reputation, he can’t protect anything.

Wilson and Barton, with beaks and feathers, looking more like their codenames than themselves, are in a nest. Not a sniper’s nest, but a real one, made of twigs and grass and bright pieces of yarn–red and purple, naturally–and at least one torn-up porn magazine.

It’s the quote above that makes him turn his face and hide his mouth in the upturned collar of his coat.

_“Caw caw, motherfuckers.”_

If anyone knew what Captain America doodled while he waited for the world to end…

Steve glances up in time to catch him hiding his smile. He smirks all the way up to his eyes.

“Need something, sir?”

“No, Cap. Carry on.”

 

-4-

There’s a quinjet in flames and what’s left of the newsstand is on fire, too. Natasha looks harried; there’s a swirl of angry scribbles over her head, her curls in disarray, and her jumpsuit appears to be smoking at the elbows.

_“Fly? Yes,”_  reads the bubble above a sheepish Barton’s head.  _“Land? No.”_

Nick chokes back a burst of laughter and turns quickly away. He’s glad Steve finally got around to seeing the Indiana Jones movies.

 

-5-

He supposes it was only a matter of time and doubts it’s the first time Steve has drawn him. He likes it. Oh, he didn’t get Errol Flynn’s hair, and that’s a damn shame, but he likes the wiry curls on his chest in the open V of the billowing shirt, he likes the goatee, and he likes the detail of the sword–an Army issue officer’s sword, not a lightsaber like Flynn’s. He looks like a real pirate captain.

The skull and crossed bones on the eyepatch are a bit much, though.

Steve flips the sketchbook shut in a hurry, but he doesn’t look all that guilty. Nick just shakes his head and lets Steve see the smile.

If his six-year-old self could see him now, he’d make the pirate connection, too. And he’d be  _happy_.

And maybe the next time he queues up a mission briefing, just maybe he “accidentally” shows a few seconds of  _Captain Blood_.

 

+1

Steve catches him, and Nick will neither confirm nor deny that he intended that. He finishes carefully ripping the page out of the book, closes it, and straightens. He meets Steve’s eye.

Steve looks like he wants to say something, mouth open and a deep inhale, but he stops. He frowns a little and gives Nick a curious look, but he doesn’t ask.

Very deliberately, Nick folds the stolen drawing. He tucks it into the inside breast pocket of his coat, in right beside the dog tags he carries that not even Natasha knows about. He gives Steve another moment, a chance to say something, and when he doesn’t, he turns around and leaves the common room.

He doesn’t have to watch the surveillance feed to know Steve searches the notebook to figure out which drawing he took.

Alone in his office, Fury takes out the drawing and the dog tags. He rubs the tags between his fingers, the metal worn so smooth the information he’s long since memorized is gone, and he studies the drawing with a small smile.

He’s wearing a stiff-necked shirt and vest and a boater’s hat, standing at the street organ painted like a helicarrier and bearing the SHIELD logo, organ grinder to his team of costumed monkeys performing for an unseen crowd against the background of a burning city.


End file.
